Chatter Report: Sechet Claims Cashaccount a Potential ‘Privacy Disaster’, Voorhees Defends Coinbase

News

In today’s roundup of crypto chatter, Jonathan Silverblood responds to Amaury Sechet’s privacy concerns with Cashaccount. Erik Voorhees defends Brian Armstrong from criticism on the latter’s 10 year bitcoin [BTC] anniversary tweets. Also, Nikita Zhavoronkov congratulates bitcoin [BTC] for creating 1 billion outputs on the BTC blockchain.

Also read: The Cashaccount.info Platform Tethers Names to Bitcoin [BTC] Cash Addresses

Amaury Sechet’s Privacy Concerns With Cashaccount

bitcoin ABC lead developer Amaury Sechet took to Twitter recently, proclaiming that the new BCH-powered alias-address system Cashaccount will be a privacy disaster. Surprisingly, Cashaccount creator Jonathan Silverblood agreed with Sechet, as the founder believes his project will lead to more BCH users reusing bitcoin [BTC] addresses. This would be bad for privacy, as reused addresses can be used to discover financial information that users may not wish to disclose.

I agree – it will undoubtedly increase the number of people that will reuse addresses.

Perhaps you can spend some time and help get those stealth keys that @ChrisPacia was working on more widely supported, or help progress the BIP-47 support?

— Jonathan Silverblood (@monsterbitar) January 3, 2019

To resolve the potential lack of privacy, Silverblood asked Sechet to collaborate with Openbazaar developer Chris Pacia on stealth keys, or to assist with the development of BIP-47.

However, other commentators like Crypto Pelé were not as concerned with a lack of privacy. Pelé pointed out that some BCH users are fine with the transparency that comes with reusing addresses.

Erik Voorhees Defends Brian Armstrong From Criticism

To commemorate bitcoin [BTC]’s 10th year anniversary of the Genesis Block, Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong posted a series of tweets reminiscing how he first got into bitcoin $BTC.

1/ Today is a big day for bitcoin [BTC], as it marks 10 years since the Genesis Block. Some people think I don’t like to talk about bitcoin [BTC] (😀), but today I have a few words to say

— Brian Armstrong (@brian_armstrong) January 3, 2019

In the thread, Armstrong recounts reading the bitcoin [BTC] white paper in 2010 and becoming obsessed about bitcoin [BTC] for the subsequent 6 months. He began building a bitcoin $BTC wallet for Android devices as a side project, but then pivoted to a hosted wallet and a custom bitcoin [BTC] node. After securing funding from Ycombinator, Armstrong started working on his business idea full time and settled on the company name Coinbase. He then ended the tweet-storm on a positive note, boldly proclaiming that he has “never had more conviction” on the future of cryptocurrencies.

Not everyone responded positively to Armstrong’s tweets. Commentator Simon Moon called Armstrong out for being a fake libertarian, arguing that Coinbase is a government-backed monopoly.

Hah… as if their business just “appeared” and had a moat of regulation around it. The regulation isn’t their fault, and they have to walk a very delicate line. Yet millions enter the ecosystem because of the tools (read: bridge) that CoinBase has built.

— Erik Voorhees (@ErikVoorhees) January 4, 2019

Shapeshift CEO Erik Voorhees quickly stepped in to defend Coinbase’s CEO. Voorhees pointed out that regulation was not Coinbase’s fault and that Coinbase has helped introduce millions of people to cryptocurrency.

1 Billion Outputs on the BTC Blockchain

Blockchair lead developer Nikita Zhavoronkov also took to social media to wish bitcoin [BTC] a happy 10th birthday. While many congratulated bitcoin [BTC] on it’s Genesis Block, Zhavoronkov took the opportunity to congratulate bitcoin [BTC] for creating 1 billion outputs on the BTC blockchain.

Not only it’s the 10th bitcoin [BTC] birthday today, but also a new landmark has been achieved — now there are more than 1 billion outputs created on the bitcoin [BTC] blockchain (see https://t.co/bKMI1xgYsf for stats) — what an interesting coincidence! pic.twitter.com/jeWJwLkVQ1

— Nikita Zhavoronkov (@nikzh) January 3, 2019

What do you think of privacy issues surrounding the Cashaccount’s identification system? Let us know in the comments below.

Images courtesy of Shutterstock.

Need to know the price of bitcoin $BTC? Check this chart.

Published at Fri, 04 Jan 2019 09:05:14 +0000

December 20, 2017

Mining Max Pyramid Scheme Comes Crashing Down

The US-based mining platform, who cheated thousands of investors out of millions of dollars, now has to answer for their crimes after they were caught in South Korea.

The crypto industry has had its fair share of negative press over the years. However, its allure cannot be ignored. The fact that it continues to grow in price and popularity makes people want it even more. Based on its upward trajectory, who wouldn’t want a piece of bitcoin?

Money to Be Made From Mining

About 18,000 investors from over 54 countries turned to the Mining Max platform to help them capitalize on the crypto industry. The benefits they promised didn’t just stop at bitcoin though. According to the International Business Times, their high-performing mining farm in Seoul mined cryptocurrencies from different blockchains, supposedly giving these investors the option of putting their money on currencies that would offer higher returns.

About 14,000 investors are from South Korea. A total of 2,600 is from the US, 600 are from China and the rest are from Japan and other countries.

Classic Pyramid Scheme

Stay Safe Online did a review article in June this year that not only detailed their tiered ROI structure but also raised the question of whether or not Mining Max was a scam.

Even though they promised these high returns based on their mining activities, the platform’s money was actually made through a pyramid scheme. Users would have to pay to become members and then were compensated for recruiting new business.

The cracks began to show when their mining endeavors failed to make enough money to pay their lower-level investors. According to Yonhap News Agency, those higher up on the food chain were paid with funds obtained through the scam, in addition to certain expensive items.

Fraud, Interpol, and a Cool $250 Million

A total of 21 suspects were charged with fraud and violating South Korea’s law on door-to-door sales. Three other people with ties to the company, including Korean singer Park Jung-Woon, were charged with embezzlement but were not held.

Another seven co-conspirators, including Mining Max chairman, Daniel Park, its vice chairman and high-level investors have gone into hiding, but have been placed on one of Interpol’s wanted lists.

According to Yonhap, investors were scammed out of approximately $250 million, of which $80 million was spent on mining hardware. About $110 million is probably sitting in offshore accounts somewhere, while the remaining money was used to pay high-level investors, and of course, to line the pockets of the platform’s management team.

Do you think that we’ll be seeing more of these kinds of schemes as cryptocurrencies become more popular? Let us know in the comments below!

Images courtesy of AFP, Shutterstock

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